Great Porn Dragon:fusillade762: BarkingUnicorn: Chariset: MacEnvy: In Europe, moose are called "elk". What we call elk in North America are actually "wapiti".

Hippity hoppity goes the wapiti

"Buffalo" are also technically "bison."

Except in Europe, where bison are "wisent."

Do they make the same sound?

If you're talking about that deep, almost subsonic "MUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUH" noise that bison make, yes, wisent make the same noise.

If you're talking on whether European "elk" (aka moose) and American elk (aka wapiti) make the same noise...well, no, because one's a goddamn moose and the other is some big deer that has learned to howl and trample tourists who get too close to them in national parks. :D

And we won't even get into what they call caribou in Europe. :D (Hint: They've managed to domesticate the things, like llamas with antlers :D)

Actually, let's do talk about what they call caribou in Europe--I wrote a whole MA thesis about it!

\not even scratching the surface\\not just Europe, either\\\sorry about the shiatty screenshots

That reminds me of a Pont cartoon (British cartoonist, remarkable use of spare lines and wit) in which a man, possibly a zoo keeper, is running in panic shouting "A moose is loose." A man sitting with another fellow on a park bench says something like "Before I panic, I would inquire whether he is from North or South of the Humber". The joke being that Scots and some others in the North of England pronounce "mouse" to sound like "moose".

Strictly speaking though, the British do not call a moose an elk. They call an elk a moose. They have no moose. There are genuine moose in the North American sense in Northern Europe, however, so the animal in the Monty Python sketch might have been an elk or a moose in the North American sense. Moose are less aggressive than elks, perhaps because their horns are not as sharp and bony. Moose horn is made of keratin, the same stuff that makes mammalian hair and insect exoskeletons.

The moose is the largest member of the deer family, or cervidae.

My uncle by marriage was out hunting with his brother-in-law when his brother-in-law had a heart attack. He carried the man (who was quite obese) 12 miles out of the woods. Ironically, the moose meat would have been lighter.

No moose has ever biten my sister. She did pat a dogfish on the head once though, and was not biten by the shark, either. The dogfish was a display in a marine centre, but was not intended as part of a petting zoo.

They also had a humungous lobster, one of the largest in the world at the time.

red5ish:Elk are gigantic. Do not mess with Elk. And by Elk I mean Wapiti. And by wapiti I mean Cervus canadensis. These things.[imageshack.us image 450x332]

I think you mean Cervus elaphus ssp canadensis. And they aren't nearly as big or potentially intimidating as moose. And by moose I mean one of several subspecies of Alces alces. Especially ssp gigas. They make elk look like muntjac. And by muntjac I mean Muntiacus reevsii.

/work intimately with all three. And by intimately, I mean I've had experience in cervid reproductive research. Wait, what?

Great Porn Dragon:fusillade762: BarkingUnicorn: Chariset: MacEnvy: In Europe, moose are called "elk". What we call elk in North America are actually "wapiti".

Hippity hoppity goes the wapiti

"Buffalo" are also technically "bison."

Except in Europe, where bison are "wisent."

Do they make the same sound?

If you're talking about that deep, almost subsonic "MUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUH" noise that bison make, yes, wisent make the same noise.

If you're talking on whether European "elk" (aka moose) and American elk (aka wapiti) make the same noise...well, no, because one's a goddamn moose and the other is some big deer that has learned to howl and trample tourists who get too close to them in national parks. :D

And we won't even get into what they call caribou in Europe. :D (Hint: They've managed to domesticate the things, like llamas with antlers :D)

Great Porn Dragon:fusillade762: BarkingUnicorn: Chariset: MacEnvy: In Europe, moose are called "elk". What we call elk in North America are actually "wapiti".

Hippity hoppity goes the wapiti

"Buffalo" are also technically "bison."

Except in Europe, where bison are "wisent."

Do they make the same sound?

If you're talking about that deep, almost subsonic "MUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUH" noise that bison make, yes, wisent make the same noise.

If you're talking on whether European "elk" (aka moose) and American elk (aka wapiti) make the same noise...well, no, because one's a goddamn moose and the other is some big deer that has learned to howl and trample tourists who get too close to them in national parks. :D

And we won't even get into what they call caribou in Europe. :D (Hint: They've managed to domesticate the things, like llamas with antlers :D)

Actually that was more a joke about how different countries have different sounds for animals. For example American ducks go "quack quack" while French ducks go "coin coin".

MacEnvy:In Europe, moose are called "elk". What we call elk in North America are actually "wapiti".

I did not know that and I thought you were just bs-ing. But according to wikipedia that's correct. So when Europeans say "a møøse once bit my sister", they really mean it was an elk. So I guess elk bites kan be pretty nasti.